The website of Children's Author, Jackie Yeager

Thanksgiving 2014

There’s nothing like a day of thanks to make a girl reflect on the things she’s grateful for…

And it got me thinking about all of you. I’m so very happy you stumbled upon my blog. At this time last year, I had very little traffic. It was targeted mostly at kid writers back then. But I branched out to writers of all ages, and I’m so glad I did! This site has grown quite a lot and I’ve “met” so many amazing people! It’s nice to know there are others out there who share in my passion for writing. 🙂 So, thank you for being here and for being so amazing!

Since so many of you are new to my blog, I thought you might like to read my Thanksgiving post from last year. In it, I talk about my writing journey. If you’re interested to know my story—how I began writing,go here.

In the year since I’ve posted that, a lot has happened in my efforts to become a writer. As you all know by now, I’m still working on getting my fictional work published. But as far as my day job goes, I am so grateful that this year I began to write professionally! As in, I get paid to write for companies. Seriously. How cool is that? For me, it’s the coolest! I get to create content, edit, proofread, and other fun stuff like that. I write training manuals, company documents, blog posts, and I’m even ghostwriting a non-fiction manuscript now too. So even though my dream is to write for children full time, this isn’t a bad job to have. In fact it’s pretty great!

Ever since I became a writer seven years ago, I thought the only way I’d be happy, would be to become a published author. But this year I realized that even though that will make me immensely happy, I am happy as I am. Small successes have taught me that. The relationships I’ve made with other writers have taught me that. And the family that means more than any of it has taught me that too.

And so on this week of Thanksgiving, I hope you’ll reflect on all that you’re grateful for too. We all have so many things. There’s always someone out there who has it harder than we do, even though sometimes it doesn’t feel that way. So whether you’re spending a quiet day at home tomorrow, celebrating with your large extended family, or live in a place where tomorrow is not Thanksgiving Day, I wish for you a peaceful moment or two and plenty of time to realize how much you really have. I’ll be doing the same at my house too!

And no I didn’t forget…

The winners of the ARC of Beth Hautala’s MG debut, WAITING FOR UNICORNS are: